Tagged Erdogan

Reports of torture are nothing new in Turkey, particularly since the 2016 coup attempt. This set the scene for an unprecedented crackdown on anyone considered ‘enemies of the state’. Since then, over 100,... Be More Curious...

The saga, surrounding the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), finally came to an end this February (2019) with a brand new North Macedonia label stamped over the old contested FYROM... Be More Curious...

As a negotiating candidate country to the European Union, at least officially, Turkey continues to benefit from pre-accession assistance (IPA). Turkey’s negotiating process, in fact, has been ailing for a long time and gradually reaching the standstill p... Be More Curious...

Turkey is in a continuous election race as the local elections to be held on 31 March will be the 6th elections in the last five years. Besides the ongoing electoral tension, the country has also been in ... Be More Curious...

It is safe to say that in the history of European Union’s enlargement, opening in 1973 with the accession of Britain, Denmark and Ireland, the first spectacular failure is the candidacy of the Republic of... Be More Curious...

As part of our "Beyond Europe" research program, we have interviewed Cengiz Aktar who is a professor of political science at the University of Athens and a columnist for Ahval. Among many other issues, we discussed the way in which the European Union can... Be More Curious...

On the 6th March 2019, Vocal Europe organised an expert panel discussion on the future of EU-Turkey relations under the question “Can the European Union remain connected to Turkey?”. The central pa... Be More Curious...

It has been fourteen years since the negotiations on Turkey’s accession to the European Union (EU) were formally opened and the process has been bumpy to say the least. Whereas the European leaders ... Be More Curious...

In Ukraine, this year’s celebrations for the Orthodox Christmas on January 7 assumed a whole new meaning, as the Ukrainian Orthodox Church has now gained its religious independence - or autocephaly - from the Moscow Patriarchate.
The official decre... Be More Curious...

For much of the international community watching, ‘Ayşe will go on holiday again’ means very little. Especially if 1974 is before your time, you may have wondered what such a bizarrely innocuous phrase ... Be More Curious...

There is one issue that has preoccupied Europe since the outbreak of civil war in Syria in 2011: immigration. More than six million Syrians are internally displaced and five million have fled to neighbo... Be More Curious...

Following the attempted coup d’état since July 2016, Turkey has been pursuing a two-track strategy towards the European Union (EU). Mainly, because of the course of action adopted by President Erdoğan Administration concerning the treatment of the ... Be More Curious...

As part of our Monday Talks series, we have conducted an interview with Mr. Pavel Telička, Vice President of the European Parliament, to discuss the situations of several important countries including... Be More Curious...

Turkey is a vital NATO ally and strategic partner of the West. Yet, over the past two years its relationship with the Western democracies and their allies has deteriorated. The catalyst for this was the... Be More Curious...

The latest demonstrations that took place in Romania this last summer have showed that the figure of Liviu Dragnea is polarising Romanian society. As in other cases of power accumulation in political figures, a detriment to institutional politics, Drag... Be More Curious...

First Kosovo. Then Moldova, Georgia, now Ukraine. Or just the way around. Not important. But everywhere the same unbelievable facts of parallel and somehow frightening tendencies over last months and ye... Be More Curious...

Despite ongoing tensions between Turkey and its Western allies, the German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier invited his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan for a state visit in late September. The... Be More Curious...

After the June elections, the Turkish opposition is in disarray. It seems to be out of ideas while trying to reorganize itself. Even the ongoing currency crisis with the USA was not enough to make the opposition snap out of this a circle of decay. Ther... Be More Curious...

On last Friday, Turkish Lira has fallen to a record low against the dollar suffering its worst one-day lost. At the wee hours Turkish lira has traded at the exchange rate of 6.30 Dollar and 7.22 Euro.
... Be More Curious...

Like France or the United Kingdom, Turkey runs schools located outside of its territory. However, unlike the other examples, the Turkish schools were not managed by the state, at least until very recent... Be More Curious...

Analysts in Europe, the US and Turkey have focused on how the latest victory of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in the presidential elections and the victory of the Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (AKP) in the parliamentary elections (alongside its ultranationalist and ra... Be More Curious...

Mesut Ozil, Germany’s star football player of Turkish origin has announced his retirement from Germany’s national team on Sunday. Ozil stated discrimination and racism he has experienced particularly after ... Be More Curious...

Rather than talking about the necessity of cooperation between the EU and Turkey, an issue that has been triggering a massive body of literature, this analysis will focus on what strategy the EU mig... Be More Curious...

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took the oath of office on July 9, which officially closed a page in Turkey’s history and started the new government system. Erdogan had won out the 24 June elections by taking 52 percent of the votes and has been ele... Be More Curious...

It is an eerily familiar sight: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claims victory in a televised address. Across Turkey and several European capitals victory celebrations erupt in chants of the president’s name... Be More Curious...

In recent days, Angela Merkel’s visit in Sochi to meet President Vladimir Putin, followed by Emmanuel Macron’s flight to St. Pietersburg to meet the former KGB lieutenant recently elected President for the ... Be More Curious...

Only a few days left for Turkey’s June 24 snap elections. Turkey will hold to two elections: parliamentary and presidential on Sunday. It is of capital importance. In April 2017 referendum people of Turkey voted in favour of a presidential system. June 24 ... Be More Curious...

Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s move to close mosques frustrates Turkey’s President Erdogan. Kurz’s statement on closing seven mosques and expel around 60 imams and their families seems to trigger a ne... Be More Curious...

There is a complex web of vested interests and moral battles surrounding the notorious Gaza conflict. The deaths of Palestinians being used as ‘human shields’ have been used as a political bargaining chip b... Be More Curious...

Hasan Hüseyin Demir moved from Hassa, a small city in the Turkish province of Hatay to Kosovo in 2012 to work first as an educator and then as a school principal. His life was following the normal path of an expat. Hasan’s story, however, has taken an unex... Be More Curious...

Since the July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey, 4,463 judges and prosecutors have been dismissed from their jobs, leaving behind a non-impartial and non-independent judicial system. This is paramount to the fur... Be More Curious...

At Tuesday’s press conference with Turkey’s President Erdogan, the best Theresa May could muster in the form of condemnation of Turkey’s human rights abuses was a pious reminder: “I have underlined to Presi... Be More Curious...

Six Turkish nationals, five education workers and a cardiologist, living in Kosovo have been arrested by Kosovar authorities and handed over to Turkish Intelligence last week. The international community is shocked by the unlawful nature of arrest and rend... Be More Curious...

On the 29th March 2018, six Turkish nationals from a college in Kosovo were “urgently” detained, arrested, and subsequently deported to Turkey due to alleged links to exiled cleric Fethullah Gülen. No doubt tha... Be More Curious...

After Monday’s summit in Varna, Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Boyko Borissov could heave a sigh of relief. Beforehand, he feared the meeting between European Council President Donald Tusk and European President... Be More Curious...

The state of the rule of law, democracy and human rights in Turkey is shocking. Since the failed coup, the Turkish government misuses the steadily prolonged state of emergency to silence critics from all fields. Members of the opposition, journalists, huma... Be More Curious...

As part of our Monday Talks series, we have hosted Ana Gomes and Anders Vistisen to discuss the current state of the relations between the European Union and Turkey. The two influential members of... Be More Curious...

Names in this article have been changed to protect their identity.
Since the infamous July 15th, 2016 coup attempt in Turkey, 4,560 judges and prosecutors have been dismissed from duty, allowing the judi... Be More Curious...

No doubt that there is a new and strange alliance in Turkey’s current political landscape. However, to understand the full awkwardness of this co-operation, one needs to take a few steps back in time to the year 2007, when the two protagonists of this stor... Be More Curious...

Hüseyin Demirtaş was a Turkish Navy Officer for 22 years, after spending eight years at Naval High School and Naval Academy. He served in various regions as a Commanding Officer of a Frigate, and as a Turki... Be More Curious...

OOver the past two years, numerous innocent people of the Caucasus and Central Asia in Turkey have been targeted within the police operations against ISIS, and the operations and following deportations coincide... Be More Curious...

Many labelled the visit of the Turkish President to Greece early on December as historic. It had been more than six decades since a Turkish President stepped his foot in Athens, and during that time the relations between the two neighbors reached the point o... Be More Curious...

Since the July 15th 2016 coup-attempt in Turkey, those deemed to have links to the Gulenist movement have faced countless human rights abuses. Since then, 131,995 people have been detained, and many more di... Be More Curious...

On March 18, 2016, the EU and Turkey signed a deal, effective immediately, with the broad goal of stemming the flow of “irregular migration” into Europe, and creating safe and legal channels by which to reach t... Be More Curious...

In the 19th century, Daniel Webster wrote, “Justice is the greatest interest of man on earth. It is the ligament which holds civilized beings and civilized nations together.”
Justice refers to fairness in punishment of wrongdoing and protection of citizens... Be More Curious...

It has been the four years since corruption scandals implicating President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, his family members and prominent high-level politicians and bureaucrats were revealed to the country on December ... Be More Curious...

TTurkey and Israel were once close allies, bonded as two states surrounded by hostile regimes. However, Turkey has stated in recent days that US President Donald Trump’s move to declare Jerusalem the capita... Be More Curious...

Magic bullets, hypodermic needles and the media. It’s an odd mix, but it can help to explain why at least some people simply believe whatever they are told.
According to the magic bullet (or hypodermic needle) theory, the mass media have a direct, immediat... Be More Curious...

In August 2017, the news outlet TR724 revealed that there are 668 children under the age of six in Turkey’s prisons. 149 of these children are under twelve months old, and there are many others under the ag... Be More Curious...

Ithas become difficult to keep track of Turkey recently. In less than a month, four biggest mayors from Erdogan’s party were forced to resign. If we count the mayors that he appointed trustees upon, more than 3... Be More Curious...